The following application is incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein: U.S. application Ser. No. 10/322,335 filed Dec. 17, 2002.
Multimedia presentations that are presented on different rendering devices (e.g., video display and stereo system) typically require that the different content of the presentation be rendered in a synchronized manner. For example, a multimedia presentation may include video, audio, and text content that should be rendered in a synchronized manner. The audio and text content may correspond to the dialogue of the video. Thus, the audio and text contents need to be rendered in a synchronized manner with the video content. Typically, the content of a multimedia presentation is stored at a single location, such as on a disk drive of a source device. To render the presentation, the source device retrieves each different type of content and sends it to the appropriate rendering device to effect the multimedia presentation. The source device then sends the content to the rendering devices in sufficient time so that the rendering devices can receive and render the content in a timely manner.
Various rendering devices, however, may have different time domains that make the rendering of the multimedia presentation in a synchronized manner difficult. For example, video and audio rendering devices may have system clocks that operate at slightly different frequencies. As a result, the video and audio content will gradually appear to the person viewing the presentation to be out of synchronization. The rendering of content in a synchronized manner is made even more difficult because some rendering devices may have multiple time domains. For example, an audio rendering device may have a system clock and a clock on a digital signal processing (“DSP”) interface card. In such a case, the combination of clocks may result in the presentation becoming even more quickly out of synchronization.
It would be desirable to have the technique that would facilitate the rendering of the multimedia presentation in a synchronized manner.